Novaya Opera/ Balet Moskva

The Nutcracker. Not a Fairytale

11-12 September
Ballet

The Nutcracker. Not a Fairytale

Novaya Opera/Balet Moskva

Music by Pyotr Tchaikovsky

Contemporary ballet

The production runs 2 hours, including one intermission

12+

Art Seasons presents

Cast

The cast will be announced soon.

Creative Team

Choreographer and Director: Pavel Glukhov

Music Director and Conductor: Anton Torbeev

Libretto by: Pavel Glukhov and Tatyana Belova

Set Designer: Larisa Lomakina

Costume Designer: Svetlana Tegin

Lighting Designers: Tatyana Mishina and Andrey Kostyuchenkov

Video Designer: Alexey Bychkov ,

Key Photo: by Ira Polyarnaya

Having premiered last February at Novaya Opera/Balet Moskva in Moscow, The Nutcracker. Not a Fairytale is an amazing journey full of revelations and discoveries, starting from the very famous music by Pyotr Tchaikovsky. The Nutcracker by Pyotr Tchaikovsky is performed live without any cuts or tempo alterations. However, the vision of Pavel Glukhov, the choreographer, has changed the usual perception, revealing unexpected depth and new emotions in the well-known music. The choreographer and his creative team have managed to discern a completely new narrative, balancing on the border between the proximate and the distant, the historical and the poetic, the past, the present, and the future.

The libretto's authors, Pavel Glukhov and Tatyana Belova, have created a story of a young soldier Nataniel who went to World War I and came home alive but internally numb, traumatized by the experience. The after-war Nataniel lives through the flashbacks, featuring alternating moments of ultimate happiness and the deepest suffering.

The performance follows his memories and brings the audience from the atelier of the doll maker to the main square of a French town decorated for Christmas and on to the battlefield. The joy of life and the excitement of first love are taken away and then restored. Nataniel is saved by Clara, his sweetheart, and her uncompromised love. The unstoppable flow of time melts the past into the future; spring comes back in blossom and love reasserts its healing power.

In two acts, a prologue and an epilogue, choreographer Pavel Glukhov explores the language of contemporary dance, pushing the boundaries to convey the transformations of his hero, starting from the naive and dreamy self, passing through the limbo of emotional void, and thriving for the magic resurrection at the end.

The psychological transformation of the main character is meticulously reflected both in choreography and visual representation. Larisa Lomakina, set designer, managed to create a poetic space, melting the present and the past, the memories and the dreams, the coziness of an old French town and the insensibility of little wooden soldiers in the atelier. The palette created by Svetlana Tegin, costume designer, goes from the sepia of old photos in the beginning to the vibrant spring colors toward the end.

About The Theatre Novaya Opera/Balet Moskva

The Theatre Novaya Opera/Balet Moskva was created 35 years ago for the most prominent maestro, Evgeny Kolobov, and remains to this day the only known theatre to be built for the conductor. Founded by the visionary and the reformer Novaya Opera/Ballet Moskva follows his footsteps: a young and vibrant company today pursues the search of revolutionary modern art. Located at the heart of Moscow in the Ermitage Garden, the former Theatre Garden, the company inherited the spirit of great Russian culture and carries it on, toward top standards and new sensations.

About Pavel Glukhov

Choreographer Pavel Glukhov is at the top of Russian contemporary dance. He made a brilliant career as a dancer, then studied choreography under the world-famous Mikhail Lavrovsky. Pavel Glukhov is gifted with a rare talent of drama making, creating deeply psychological characters without words. His recent premieres at Novaya Opera/Ballet Moskva include Les Noces by Igor Stravinsky (2024) and The Nutcracker. Not a Fairytale by Pyotr Tchaikovsky (2026). Both had a profound impact on the audience and were highly acclaimed by the critics. Pavel Glukhov is also a curator of the Festival of contemporary dance Diana Vishneva. Context and a multiple prize winner, including the prestigious national Golden Mask award as the Best Choreographer of the Year in 2022.

About Art Seasons

Art Seasons is a nonprofit cultural organization and production company that brings both established and emerging Russian artists to audiences in Russia and abroad. In 2025-2026, Art Seasons presented theater productions B.R and Сonstellations (by the a39 company), as well as performances of Romeo and Juliet and Swan Lake by the Bolshoi Theatre in Istanbul. Since 2021, Art Seasons has run Seasons, Festival of Contemporary Culture, held every year in Gelendzhik, a southern city in Russia. The festival highlights the most prominent Russian names in music, dance, theater, and cinema. For more information, visit our social media: @artseasons.world.

Event Rules

Detailed information regarding ticket purchase, cancellation, refund, and exchange policies can be found through official ticket sales channels.
For events where student discounts are applicable, student tickets are valid only with a valid student ID and can be purchased from the AKM Box Office. The student ID must be presented to the event staff on the day of the event.
For events cancelled by Atatürk Cultural Center, the refund application period for tickets purchased from the box office is 15 days from the date of cancellation. Within this period, audience members must submit their refund requests at the AKM Box Office.
Age restrictions for our events are specified in the event rules. All attendees are required to have a valid ticket.
For Children’s Art Center workshops, the age group is specified separately. Guests whose ages do not fall within the indicated range will not be permitted to enter the workshop area. Tickets purchased for these workshops are non-refundable and non-exchangeable.
AKM Management reserves the right to deny entry to individuals deemed unsuitable for the event, in which case a refund will be issued.
AKM reserves the right to make changes to its ticket purchase policies.

AKM reserves the right to change the event venue and time.
Guests are required to adhere to the specified seating arrangement. No seat changes are allowed during the event.
After the event starts, no audience member will be allowed into the hall.
The age group for the Children’s Art Centre workshops is specified separately. Guests who do not meet the specified age requirement for the event are not allowed to enter the workshop area. Purchased tickets are non-refundable and non-changeable.
Recording with cameras, photo cameras, mobile phones, etc. is prohibited during the concert. Recording devices will not be allowed in the venues.
You must be ready with your ticket at the event entrance at least 1 hour before the event start time.
AKM can make changes to event venues. The AKM management will prepare a seating plan that provides our audience with the closest seats to their ticket numbers in the new venue. Purchased tickets are non-refundable due to the change of venue.
It is prohibited to enter areas outside the designated spaces in the venues with food or beverages, to consume tobacco and tobacco products, or to use electronic cigarettes.
There is a paid parking lot inside AKM.

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